Vietnam War

Vietnam War, (1954–75), a protracted conflict that pitted the communist government of North Vietnam and its allies in South Vietnam, known as the Viet Cong, against the government of South Vietnam and its principal ally, the United States. Called the “American War” in Vietnam (or, in full, the “War Against the Americans to Save the Nation”), the war was also part of a larger regional conflict (seeIndochina wars) and a manifestation of the Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union and their respective allies.

At the heart of the conflict was the desire of North Vietnam, which had defeated the French colonial administration of Vietnam in 1954, to unify the entire country under a single communist regime modeled after those of the Soviet Union and China. The South Vietnamese government, on the other hand, fought to preserve a Vietnam more closely aligned with the West. U.S. military advisers, present in small numbers throughout the 1950s, were introduced on a large scale beginning in 1961, and active combat units were introduced in 1965. By 1969 more than 500,000 U.S. military personnel were stationed in Vietnam. Meanwhile, the Soviet Union and China poured weapons, supplies, and advisers into the North, which in turn provided support, political direction, and regular combat troops for the campaign in the South. The costs and casualties of the growing war proved too much for the United States to bear, and U.S. combat units were withdrawn by 1973. In 1975 South Vietnam fell to a full-scale invasion by the North.

The human costs of the long conflict were harsh for all involved. Not until 1995 did Vietnam release its official estimate of war dead: as many as 2 million civilians on both sides and some 1.1 million North Vietnamese and Viet Cong fighters. The U.S. military has estimated that between 200,000 and 250,000 South Vietnamese soldiers died in the war. In 1982 the Vietnam Veterans Memorial was dedicated in Washington, D.C., inscribed with the names of 57,939 members of U.S. armed forces who had died or were missing as a result of the war. Over the following years, additions to the list have brought the total past 58,200. (At least 100 names on the memorial are those of servicemen who were actually Canadian citizens.) Among other countries that fought for South Vietnam on a smaller scale, South Korea suffered more than 4,000 dead, Thailand about 350, Australia more than 500, and New Zealand some three dozen.

Vietnam emerged from the war as a potent military power within Southeast Asia, but its agriculture, business, and industry were disrupted, large parts of its countryside were scarred by bombs and defoliation and laced with land mines, and its cities and towns were heavily damaged. A mass exodus in 1975 of people loyal to the South Vietnamese cause was followed by another wave in 1978 of “boat people,” refugees fleeing the economic restructuring imposed by the communist regime. Meanwhile, the United States, its military demoralized and its civilian electorate deeply divided, began a process of coming to terms with defeat in what had been its longest and most controversial war. The two countries finally resumed formal diplomatic relations in 1995.

A parallel increase in support to the North from both China and the Soviet Union

An insurgency of communist Vietnamese (known as the Viet Cong) against the South Vietnam Army beginning in the late 1950s that grew into an ongoing guerilla campaign

Attacks on two U.S. destroyers by North Vietnamese torpedo boats in the Gulf of Tonkin on August 5, 1964, which greatly escalated U.S. military involvement in the region and led to the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, giving the U.S. president new authority to wage war

Increasing financial and military aid from the U.S. to South Vietnam in an attempt to limit the spread of communism in the area

The defeat of France in the French Indochina War in 1954, which produced a communist government in the victorious North Vietnam (above the 17th parallel) and a democratic government in the French-influenced South Vietnam

outcomes

Economic downturn and political isolation for Vietnam, which was only supported by the Soviet Union and its allies in Eastern Europe

In contrast to the fears of the U.S. government before the war, the creation of a unified, communist Vietnam did not start a "domino effect" of spreading communism throughout the countries of the region

The collapse of the South Vietnamese government in the spring of 1975, resulting in a unified communist government in the country

The deaths of as many as 2 million Vietnamese civilians, 1.1 million North Vietnamese soldiers, 250,000 South Vietnamese soldiers, and 58,000 U.S. servicemen

The emigration of some 2 million refugees from Vietnam from the late 1970s to the early '90s